DAVE LOMBARDO Reflects On SLAYER's 'Reign In Blood': 'The Reviews Weren't All Great At The Time'

In a new interview with Ed Hack of This Day In Metal, former SLAYER drummer Dave Lombardo spoke about the 40th anniversary of the band's classic third album, "Reign In Blood". Asked when he and his then-bandmates realized they had written something significant and influential with the record that changed heavy metal in just 28 minutes and 58 seconds, Lombardo said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "Well, I think maybe it was around when our career just started moving up. People were really interested. They were coming to the shows. It had to have been — obviously the album was released [in 1986], so '87, '88, and then we released 'South Of Heaven'. It was an ongoing process. It wasn't from here to here and overnight. I think legacy bands and legendary records and stuff like that, it takes time to work on those. It takes time to grasp or to achieve.

"When other bands start imitating you, you start realizing, 'Wow, we're really influencing a lot of fans,'" Dave continued. "When they hand you a demo tape and you decide to go to the back of the bus and listen to it, and it sounds exactly [like you]. Imitation is the greatest form of flattery, but it was obvious. And then, as time goes on and, the shows you play. For example, our hometown, we played Los Angeles, the Hollywood Palladium. And there's a riot outside. They oversold the show. They got a riot squad. They're all in line getting ready with their billy clubs and ready to go in and start cracking skulls. And it's, like, 'Hey, we, we must be doing something right.' And what's cool is that you look back and it's that attitude of, 'We do what we want. It's our music. We're musicians. We're artists. We do whatever the hell we want. If you like it, welcome aboard. If you're not [into it now], well, we'll wait for you.' Cause eventually people will come around, 'cause it won't go away."

Lombardo added: "At the time you're really not aware [of how influential your music is going to become]. On occasion you go to the grocery store or the newsstand, you pick up a magazine and you see your face in it and you see a review. Sometimes those reviews, they weren't all great at the time. You guys think, 'Oh, this is a great album,' but we got shit for that record a lot of the times. But after a while, obviously, they had to conform."

"Reign In Blood" was released on October 7, 1986 through Def Jam Recordings. The album was the band's first collaboration with record producer Rick Rubin, whose input helped the band's sound evolve. Kerrang! magazine described the record as "the heaviest album of all time," and a breakthrough in thrash metal and speed metal.

"Reign In Blood"'s release was delayed because of concerns regarding its graphic artwork and lyrical subject matter. The opening track, "Angel Of Death", which refers to Josef Mengele and describes acts such as human experimentation that Mengele committed at the Auschwitz concentration camp, provoked allegations of Nazism. However, the bandmembers stated numerous times they do not condone Nazism, and are merely interested in the subject.

"Reign In Blood" was SLAYER's first album to enter The Billboard 200 chart (at No. 94). The LP was certified gold by the RIAA (Recording Industry Association Of America) on November 20, 1992 for sales in excess of 500,000 copies.

Back in October 2021, Lombardo told Metal Injection about "Reign In Blood": "I look at that album as a masterpiece. And it's one of those albums that will stand the test of time. It's brilliant. The fire, the energy that that album has. I don't hear that in other records. I don't know if it's because I'm listening to a band that I was part of that I have this perspective that's objective. But you know, it's brilliant and I'm very appreciative … I think that album will forever be like the epitome of thrash music and part of a historic time in music history… SLAYER had a certain energy that's unlike anything else. And so that definitely is for me one of the greatest metal records ever made."